You had me in the first half, but fuck insurance companies, they too are for-profit, not for-benefit-of-patient. If anything, they're some of the worst offenders at it.
I always found it strange... insurances offer a "free" annual exam, but if you need additional testing and care, you get fucked. Youd think snipping health problems in the butt as they prop up would be an incentive to reducing costs. But it just shows how corporations give zero thought to actually care and is more incentivized for people to keep paying insurances and never use it except when they are likely to expire...
They might not be buying the toothpaste, but they may very well be in partnership with or owned by the same people as the toothpaste company. I'm sure they know the brand of toothpaste you use makes very little difference in the grand scheme of things, and if they were to recommend one it wouldn't be because they're wanting what's best for you, but because some money exchanged hands.
USA centric thinking... The dentists anywhere else recommend the good stuff so you stay the fuck away from their clinic (they get paid all the same by the gov no matter how many they treat)
19% provide only private care, with no NHS, and a further 14% said they worked predominantly (over 75% of their time) in private care. Only 15% of responding dentists are fully NHS, with no private care, and a further 27% said they worked predominantly (over 75% of their time) in NHS care.
And I'm sure the numbers are similar or worse in every country where a capitalist government is running a pseudo-social service. Because they're still more concerned about the bottom line than they are about your wellbeing, so they've sold large chunks of the service off, and us poors who can't afford to go private have to put up with a deliberately underfunded, sub standard service.
Either way, you're not getting the top notch selfless service you think you are.